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Tim Hudak’s low-wage agenda is hiding in plain sight

By Sid Ryan

Tues., March 4, 2014

Tim Hudak’s alleged reversal of his controversial support for American-style “right-to-work” laws lacks all credibility. It is the sort of cagey claim that is reminiscent of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s now notorious statement: “I do not use crack cocaine, nor am I an addict of crack cocaine.” Of course, Mayor Ford was intentionally deceiving voters about his drug habits, while the truth fell somewhere between the questions reporters asked and the careful wording of Ford’s qualified answer.

On Feb. 21, Hudak, the leader of Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives, promised the Toronto business community that his party would not “change the so-called Rand Formula” that protects union dues collection and guarantees union resources for representing their members. The media eagerly reported that Hudak had “reversed his position,” “flip-flopped,” done a “U-turn” or “bowed to unions,” but nothing could be further from the truth. Like Mayor Ford, the reality of Mr. Hudak’s intentions lies in what he didn’t say. His promise comes with a wink and a nudge.

Let’s be clear: overturning Justice Ivan Rand’s 1946 decision was never explicitly part of Hudak’s message because, as he ominously boasted to his business audience, “Our agenda is a lot bigger, and a lot more ambitious, than that.” So, his pledge not to undo this foundational labour policy is neither a retraction nor a reassurance. It intentionally leaves the door wide open to accomplish his anti-worker agenda through a variety of other means.

For 18 months, Hudak’s Tories have been promising to import the meanest, most divisive anti-worker laws that the United States has to offer. While he has cloaked his strategy with murky and misleading doublespeak about the need for “flexible labour markets” and “labour law modernization,” Hudak’s intensions have always been clear: eliminate the organized opposition of workers and implement a low-wage, regulation-free haven where corporations can rake in profit at the expense of Ontario workers, communities and the environment.

Even if workers were to mistakenly believe Hudak’s pledge to not tear up the Rand Formula, they most certainly cannot trust him to leave workers’ rights intact. Hudak’s party has promised to make it more difficult to join a union and possible for individual workers to opt-out of their collective agreement. These measures would divide workplaces and have the net effect of gutting the entire basis of the Rand Formula, while allowing him to remain true to his word.

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Hudak has also made clear that he would take his anti-labour agenda much, much further. He has promised to freeze public sector wages, gut pensions for public sector workers and reduce public services through staff reductions that would hit schools and hospitals.

He would follow Alberta Premier Alison Redford in removing the third-party arbitration system that supports fair collective bargaining for front line emergency personnel who do not have the right to strike, like police and fire fighters. He would curtail workers’ from using union dues for workplace training and he would silence his opposition by restricting unions from engaging in political advocacy.

These measures would draw Ontario into a race to the bottom led by America’s 24 right-to-work states that now boast some of the lowest wages in the land. It is an agenda that no Ontario worker can afford and a scheme that would not only divide workplaces and communities, but has already divided the Tory party itself.

If there is anything to be learned from the American example, it is that the advocates of these extremist policies do not waiver or retreat from their low-wage agenda. They view economic re-engineering as a game of chess and if public outcry prevents them from doing it in one move, they will try it in three.

Hudak’s scheme is cribbed right out of the Republican playbook and just like Mayor Ford, he certainly won’t let the truth get in his way.

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